Umar Khan's Project 2 Blog

Saturday, 10 November 2012

This is the custom interface I was using for my project, I customised it very slightly focusing on getting the tools and brushes closer to me which I need the most. Like the hpolish and clay tubes I have switch around with a lot it saves a lot of time having the dynamesh resolution and blur very close by.

Above is a video of me doing the extracting and using some alphas to improve my work.

Above is some of the work I did after finishing the whole of my model because i didn't work on the model without creating the typology and the uv's etc. I did this by extracting which i learnt right at the start of the project.

Using alphas on top of alphas i made this, using drag rectangle and positioning it where i want it was very useful.

Repeating the alphas as you can see from the back made the character's back look a lot more dynamic.

I didn't include this in my final model because I never got around uving and retopolgising it but for future project I will do this.

Thursday, 8 November 2012

This is the final render of the model with the matcap white material applied to show the sculptural detail of the model.

Here is how i created the UV's for my model, its a process showing how i done it but it doesn't show the full process because it takes too long. The time-lapse video did not record the part where I show the flattened version of the mesh. So I have some images of the different maps I made.

Above is the normal map for my model.

Above is a texture map of the model that zbrush gave which I was very disappointed with because it didn't display properly in maya.

Above is the displacement map for my model

This is the ambient occlusion map for my model which got a little distorted.

This is the uv map of my model which I made using UV master plugin in zbrush. I don't know if the results of this uv is good or bad but it works.

I did some renders of my work in maya

These renders are made my using just the normal map on the low res version of the model. The results are very good.

Although there is some distortions but maybe something in the settings is wrong which I don't really know about.

This is the model in Maya rendered with metal ray , I added the maps that i got from zbrush but i don't think they all worked.

Above is the shader network of the model I made for it using the normal, ambient occlusion and texture map .

Tuesday, 6 November 2012

It was time for the hardest part of the modelling phase, creating a low resolution mesh for the character which is 4.2 million polygons, i brought it down to 11,000 polygons using the zbrush retopology tools by using a zphere. There was a lot of problems I had during this phase, first was to make the edges flow with the hard edges of the model.

Another problem was avoiding pinching points and triangles. Which was almost impossible. But I tried my best I really liked this phase because it is very challenging and fun. Zbrush does play up sometimes with the topology tools it sometimes creates vertices where you didn't lick so there was a lot of going back and forth during this phase.

Monday, 5 November 2012

The carbon fibre that i made was very hard to come around because I tried using noise maker but the results it was producing were awful it didn't look like anything I needed. So I found a way around that and that was to store a morph target of my mesh without the carbon fibre details. Then putting the carbon fibre details on by using the alpha below and tiling it within the alpha pallet, then i used drag dot to put the carbon fibre on. Switching the morph target and then morphing the carbon fibre back only was the most efficient way I could find at this time.

Also using a another alpha within zbrush i made the rust on the metal of the model which I think worked out really well.

Sunday, 4 November 2012

Using what I learn from the last two texture attempts I found out about the material painting, so using that feature MRGB and the chrome blue tint material I painted over the model with the colour spray and a alpha to get that rusty look on my model.

I time-lapsed some of the painting process I did I had all of the process but my zbrush crashed resulting in loss of the clip.

The screenshots below are some of the images of the different parts of the body which I completed. Now the only thing left is to make the carbon fibre for my model.

Friday, 2 November 2012

I was exploring texturing with materials today and I found a material that I could use for my model. Before that i changed my models head a little bit to make it look more dynamic. Other than that I didn't change anything.

I worked on the reflecting the metal materials. The previous texturing i did, was not right so I filled the model first with this blue colour then worked on the reflecting metal parts of the model.

To do this I used MRGB mode on of zbrush and I used freehand stroke with out a alpha because I wanted to make it precise.

I went over the whole model trying to get all of the parts of the model but I didn't look the way I wanted it to look. Maybe the colour I was using was just not right for this.

I was thinking to go over the darker parts of the model with a different shade of colour to make the metal parts stand out more.

Thursday, 1 November 2012

Today i attempted to texture my model with a very simple texture technique. Using the skin shade 4 and a blue colour i coloured the parts of the model which are reflective and metal like. This didn't really work out the way i wanted it to work out. But I was learning a lot.

As you can see from the side view I left out the parts of the model which I am going to apply carbon fibre effect to. I needed to get my speed up because the closing date was closing on me. So that's why I wanted to texture the model

The back of the model corresponds to the rest of the model. I was still deciding on what other colours I can apply to get a better look.

Wednesday, 31 October 2012

Today i found out about something really good that i can use for my model. Its called Clay Polish and it is in the geometry section. From what i can see, it seems to highlight the edges where they're straight as you can see from the above image of my characters wire-frame the edges are creased.

As you can see from this image, it clearly shows how effective the clay polish has been, because I am going to recreate the model's topology again, it doesn't matter about the edges.

This is the back of the model, This feature of zbrush has made the whole of my model a lot more crispier and more hard-edged which is exactly what I was looking for.

This is the hand of the model, I liked how it worked on the hands as well, now all I have to do is do a good job on texturing the model and making a good retopology.

This is the lower leg of the model, I like how it worked on the knee guards as well. I am now finished with making the sculpture now I got to texture and retopologise it. Which will take a lot of time because I have had no experience with either.

This is the front and back view of the model, I am very pleased with the results.

Tuesday, 30 October 2012

I worked on the hands today refining them and make them better by using the Dam_Standard brush and clay tubes. I wanted to add more detail to the hands like the reference material but I didn't get round to doing so because I had to move on and complete the sculpt because the deadline was closing in.

I also refined the arms and the shoulders using the hpolish and the clay tubes because of the square alpha attached to with the brush which helps me achieve the hard edges.

I also progressed on making the chest today and using the clay build-up and clay tubes I nailed down the main shape. Then using the dam standard brush and the hpolish I got the shape and sculpture perfectly the way I wanted it.

I pretty much had most of the model completed at this point but the edges weren't as straight as I wanted them to be. Still I moved on and worked on fixing some of the parts which didn't look right.

This is the back of the legs which I got to mirror using the Subtool master which is a great plugin it saved me a lot of time and it also made my work easier because I could really get into the spaces which are hard to see.

This is the front of the model and I completed the boots and the other uncompleted parts of the model and I also gave it the hard edge look by using the hpolish.